Frying pans

When my beloved and I were first married, we never had any real issues. Except for one. As every Southern woman knows, her cast iron frying pan is sacred, and never, I repeat, NEVER, to be immersed in hot water and scrubbed with a Brillo pad. You know what's coming, don't you?

Yes, my Yankee darling just didn't understand the years that had gone into seasoning that pan. Why, I could slide a pineapple upside down cake out with one gentle tap. Its finish had been ten years in the making. Aside from my sterling flatware and grandmother's Rosenthal china, and perhaps my Mikimoto pearls, nothing else I brought to my new marriage of a physical nature was more important to me.

The morning he attacked it with hot water and a scrubber was almost his last. For the first time ever, I threatened him with dire consequences, the least of which was divorce, if he ever touched my frying pan again. I can still see his shocked expression, and I am happy to say, I never had to threaten him again. He will stare at it, in all its glory, on the stove, glance at me as if checking to see if I noticed his hands itching to throw it in the sink, then he walks away. Slowly, to show me he's not scared. But I know he is. No one, I repeat, no one touches that pan but me.

I'm going to leave it to my daughters to fight over when I'm gone. Like all good Southern girls, they understand it is priceless.